Spending multiple years on the road for one tour has to be a grueling, sometimes monotonous time, but Metallica are managing to keep things fresh and fun each night be injecting their sets all over the world with songs they haven't played in years. At a May 5th show in Barcelona, Spain, the thrash quartet pulled out one of their slower and sludgier cuts with "The Thing That Should Not Be" for the first time since 2013.
The Master of Puppets deep cut saw the band lean hard on each pummeling note, gripping the enormous audience with the labored pace and sinister tones of the track. Dramatic drop-outs focus on James Hetfield's sing-song delivery snuck in between snarling growls, and despite the brief respite of a quiet passage, the cyclical chugging of the guitars and Lars Ulrich's sparse but steady drum licks keep the waves of crescendo coming back time and time again throughout the seven-minute epic. Kirk Hammett's mid-song solo is a prime example of how to create an aural hellscape using just a few select notes, accentuated by red-drenched stage lighting that added dramatic flair to the enthralling performance.
